Chris Taylor, a Wisconsin state appeals judge, won a seat on the state’s Supreme Court on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press, widening liberal control of the court to a 5-to-2 majority.
Judge Taylor, 58, a former Democratic lawmaker, promised to defend democracy and protect the right to free speech if elected. She is the third liberal to be elected to the court in three years.
In the final days of the campaign, she made a pitch to voters that leaned heavily on her liberal background, emphasizing her relatives’ union membership, her time working for Planned Parenthood and her belief that the federal government is interfering in state elections.
The court is officially nonpartisan, but the ideological leanings of its justices, who serve 10-year terms, have become common knowledge in recent decades.
After several years of Wisconsin Supreme Court elections that attracted national attention, gigantic fund-raising hauls and celebrity endorsements, the campaign this year between Judge Taylor and Maria Lazar, a conservative appeals court judge, was relatively quiet.
Several factors accounted for the race’s muted nature: It was not defined by a pivotal policy issue, partisan control of the court was not at stake and, after two losses in a row, conservatives spent less energy on this campaign than usual.
“It has been a wildly different race this year,” said Charles Franklin, a pollster for Marquette University Law School in Milwaukee.
While both candidates held campaign events and raised funds across Wisconsin, interest in the race from voters was tepid. The only televised debate of the campaign was delayed twice: first, so that Judge Taylor could be treated for kidney stones, and later because of storms wreaking havoc in the region.
Each candidate said during the debate that the other was too politically extreme for the court, and staked out policy differences in issues such as abortion rights, redistricting and voter ID laws.
Other signs have suggested a lack of interest in the race. Early voting in Wisconsin lagged far behind that of last year’s election to a different seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. The Wisconsin Elections Commission said last week that about 112,000 fewer absentee ballots had been cast this year compared with the same point last year.
A poll by Marquette Law School from March 24 showed a slight advantage for the liberal candidate: Among likely voters, 30 percent said they supported Judge Taylor and 22 percent favored Judge Lazar. Forty-six percent of the people surveyed said they were still undecided.
Judge Taylor significantly out-raised Judge Lazar, particularly with support from the state Democratic Party, which gave $775,000 to Judge Taylor’s campaign. Judge Lazar received $64,000 from the Republican Party of Wisconsin.
Many Republicans have seen Wisconsin Supreme Court elections as increasingly difficult to win, since Democrats tend to have stronger voter turnout in spring elections in the state.
Some voters have shrugged off this election because weighty policy questions on abortion and labor rights are currently not in front of the court, unlike in the last two Supreme Court races.
The opening on the court came after Justice Rebecca Bradley announced her retirement last year.
In the 2025 Wisconsin Supreme Court election, then-Judge Susan Crawford, a liberal, handily beat Brad Schimel, a conservative, despite Elon Musk pouring $25 million into the race, partly though his super PAC.
Debra Cronmiller, executive director of the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin, said that she was concerned that depressed turnout could harm local referendums.
Nonpartisan groups that focus on get-out-the-vote efforts, like hers, were bolstered by all of the national attention in 2025, she said.
Julie Bosman is the Chicago bureau chief for The Times, writing and reporting stories from around the Midwest.
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